A simulation study of the micro-grooved electrode structure for back-contact back-junction silicon solar cell

Abstract

A micro-grooved electrode structure is investigated to illustrate its advantages when applied to the back-contact back-junction (BC–BJ) silicon solar cell. The finite element analysis shows that the micro-grooved electrodes enhances the photo-carrier collection and weakens the dependence of collection ability on pitch distance. The geometries of micro-groove are found to have little impact on the cell performance. These advantages open possibilities for the implementation of low cost fabrication methods. As a demonstration, a process involving laser doping and screen printing techniques are proposed and analyzed. The simulation results show that the laser induced lattice damage causes negligible deterioration of device electrical properties and the presence of parasitic metal insulator semiconductor structure near the screen printed electrodes actually leads to a performance improvement rather than degradation. Our preliminary results indicate that the micro-grooved electrode structure is promising for fabricating low cost high efficiency BC–BJ silicon solar cells.